What Is the Best Cooling Mattress?

Why Temperature Matters

Many of us are familiar with how hard it is to fall asleep and stay cool while asleep in a room that’s too hot. This is because your body temperature during the night affects not only your ability to fall asleep but the quality of sleep you get once you do. Studies have shown that excessive body temperature can even lessen the amount of time your body spends in REM sleep. This is why your body’s temperature regulation during sleep is so important, and as we’ll explain here, your mattress can actually help or hurt your body’s ability to stay cool throughout the night. If you’re someone who sleeps hot and often wakes up during the night, we’ll tell you how to look for a mattress that can help keep you cool.

Why You Sometimes Get Hot While You Sleep

There are a lot of people out there who sleep hot, for a variety of reasons. If you’re one of them, understanding what it is that contributes to this nighttime overheating can help you remedy the problem. First, let’s get to know what’s happening in your body.

The human body is constantly regulating its temperature, and it does so to get you ready for sleep and to keep you asleep. The body’s ability to regulate its temperature begins with the thermoneutral zone, which is the core range of temperatures that the body maintains. It’s slightly different for every individual, but it typically ranges from approximately 97.6° to 98.6° F.

Just as our sleep cycle tells us when it’s time to go to sleep, our body naturally lowers its temperature to prepare us for it. While we sleep, our body’s metabolism slows down and our body temperature decreases. In the evening, as we get ready for sleep, our body temperature starts to drop and it continues to drop during the night, by releasing heat. Oftentimes, your mattress and bedding will retain that body heat which will of course make you hotter, less comfortable, and may cause you to wake up in a sweat. And as we’ll explain later, certain mattresses are better at remaining temperature neutral to help keep you cooler throughout the night.

How to Choose a Mattress That Will Keep You Cool

Temperature neutrality is an important factor to consider when shopping for a mattress. Mattresses that are made of innerspring coils, latex, and memory foam will all have different effects on the sleeper’s body temperature. It all comes down to their ability to allow air to circulate through the mattress and to keep from absorbing your body heat.

Some mattresses retain more of your body heat, and as a result, you feel warmer and more uncomfortable when you sleep on them, and your sleep can be disrupted. On the other hand, mattresses made of more breathable materials will absorb less of your body heat and promote greater airflow, which will keep the bed—and more importantly, you—much cooler.

Innerspring and Hybrid

Innerspring and hybrid mattresses are built with a system of coils. These springs are spaced in a way that allows air to pass more freely through them than it would in a mattress made of more dense material. This breathability makes innerspring and hybrid mattresses really great at keeping you cool while you sleep. If you tend to sleep hot, an innerspring or hybrid bed might be the best choice for you. Most will have a layer or two of memory foam that will add comfort, but shouldn’t cause much heat retention (more this below).

Memory Foam

While memory foam beds are exceptional at absorbing and distributing the sleeper’s weight, memory foam tends to be very dense, so these mattresses are not very breathable and consequently retain a lot of your body heat. The denser the foam, the more support you get from the mattress, the more difficult it’ll be for air to pass through, and the more it’ll retain your body heat. That said, you can find foam mattresses that are better at promoting airflow than others. Sleeping cool on a memory foam mattress is not out of the question.

Latex

Latex mattresses are very breathable and are usually made of a mixture of either pure latex or a latex and polyurethane blend. They’re very stretchable, elastic, and responsive, which gives them a similar feel to memory foam (a little bouncier), but with much better airflow. Latex is a soft, buoyant material that does not trap heat, which makes latex mattresses superior at regulating your body’s temperature while you sleep. They’re also very eco-friendly and resistant to mold and bacteria. One downside with latex mattresses is that they can get more expensive than most other varieties.

Teched-out

Today, some mattresses come with new technology specifically designed to help regulate temperature, and we’re seeing new advances year after year. The Pod from Eight Sleep, for example, is built with sensors that track your body temperature throughout the night and can automatically adjust the temperature of the bed accordingly through a liquid-based temperature control system. So if you sleep hot and are interested in stepping up your temperature control, you can turn to new tech.

Tips for Staying Cool While You Sleep

• The ideal temperature for sleeping is 65 degrees Fahrenheit, so set your bedroom thermostat accordingly. It may feel cold at first, but if you’re like us, you’ll try anything for better sleep!
• Bring your hands and/or feet out from under the covers. Your hands and feet are temperature regulators. As your body cools itself at bedtime, it releases heat from your core out through your extremities, so having your hands or feet outside the covers will keep that heat from getting trapped.
• Take a hot shower or bath before bedtime. This can actually help you cool down before bed. And its relaxing effect can also help you fall asleep more easily.
• Find a mattress that’s right for you. If you sleep hot, you’ll want one that promotes airflow and doesn’t retain heat.